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SUMMARY:Sense of Place lecture series: "The Public Graphosphere" - Simon F
 ranklin (Cambridge)
DTSTART:20151112T173000Z
DTEND:20151112T190000Z
UID:TALK60816@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:21355
DESCRIPTION:In the ancient city\, the stones spoke. Public spaces were spa
 ces of visible words. In the Middle Ages\, however\, words were largely re
 moved from the public gaze except in enclosed spaces\, such as churches. T
 his lecture considers how the verbal void became filled in the transition 
 to modernity. When and why did what kinds of visible words infiltrate publ
 ic spaces in Russia? What have they meant\, not just as the bearers of par
 ticular verbal messages\, but as reflections of\, and as contributors to\,
  a changing sense of public space? To what extent was the process indigeno
 us\, and to what extent was it prompted by contacts with Western Europe? T
 he emergence of the Russian public ‘graphosphere’ took several centuri
 es\, and involved several ‘false starts’. In it can be traced the shif
 ting and sometimes competing claims to spatial presence and authority of t
 he Church\, the State\, commerce\, and\, eventually\, private individuals.
  The lecture explores and illustrates  material ranging from statues to sh
 op-signs\, from posters to triumphal arches. The focus of attention is mai
 nly\, though not exclusively\, on Moscow and St Petersburg. \n\nAbout the 
 Speaker:\nSimon Franklin is Professor of Slavonic Studies in the Universit
 y of Cambridge.  He has published extensively on the history and culture o
 f early Rus\, and also on aspects of Russian culture of the 17th\, 18th an
 d 19th centuries. Books include Sermons and Rhetoric of Kievan Rus’ (199
 1)\;  The Emergence of Rus c. 750-1200 (with Jonathan Shepard\, 1996)\; Wr
 iting\, Society and Culture in Early Rus (2002)\; and National Identity in
  Russian Culture: an Introduction (co-edited\, with Emma Widdis\, 2004). T
 his lecture reflects aspects of his current research on the social and cul
 tural history of technologies of the word in Russia up to the mid-19th cen
 tury.\n
LOCATION:Umney Theatre\, Robinson College\, Cambridge
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